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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22489432">The Mess That Started It All</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReluctantMandalore/pseuds/ReluctantMandalore'>ReluctantMandalore</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Mandalorian Fic Requests (Din Djarin x Reader) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Wars - All Media Types, The Mandalorian (TV)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Gender Neutral Pronouns, Love Confessions, M/M, Mando is mean, Multi, Pining, Sorry Not Sorry, Swearing, apparently it is my goal in life to hurt the reader emotionally, but I decided to change it, gender neutral reader, if theres still any pronoun or gender errors let me know!, it ends up sweet later on, makes up for it thou, used to be fem reader, you - Freeform</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-01-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-01-31</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 15:08:14</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>3,704</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22489432</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/ReluctantMandalore/pseuds/ReluctantMandalore</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>The Mandalorian and you have been traveling together for some months now, everything was going well until Mando’s attitude towards you changed dramatically. It isn’t until a certain mess, courtesy of the child, causes for the man’s true feelings to come to light.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/Reader, The Mandalorian (The Mandalorian TV)/You</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>The Mandalorian Fic Requests (Din Djarin x Reader) [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2214606</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>166</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>The Mess That Started It All</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This was a request that I did for someone on my tumblr no-droids-allowed ^-^</p><p>Edits: Fixed some pronoun/gender slip ups and removed any y/n’s. If you see anymore of either please tell me!!</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>To say you found seeing a bounty hunter running about your little town, with a small green child in tow, only just kind of strange was a lie. In fact you found it very strange and highly concerning. </p><p>  When you first spotted the pair the first thought that crossed your mind was that you were just seeing things. Why would a bounty hunter, a mandalorian one no less, have a child with them? It just didn’t seem logical and also seemed very dangerous in regards to the child’s safety. However, as the whispers of the townsfolk began to spread, and you soon realized what you had seen really was just that. A Mandalorian and his child companion. </p><p>You honestly weren’t sure exactly why the Mandalorian had the child with him and honestly you didn’t really plan on asking. At least, you hadn’t until you witnessed the incident in the cantina.</p><p>   This incident being Mando finding his apparent target, who he had body slammed into the ground as both of them broke out into a full on fight in the middle of cantina. The cherry on top in this whole ordeal was when the Mandalorian had then proceed to follow his now fleeing bounty out the door. Thus, leaving his green wide eyed son behind at table where you, an employee, were placing down his freshly ordered bone soup.</p><p> To be fair on his part, he did call out for you to watch the kid before flying out the door. So it's not like he just completely abandoned his child in a newly trashed cantina, but it was definitely not something most parents would do. At least you thought so anyway. </p><p> You did as he said, keeping a close eye on the child way past your shift and into the night while your coworkers did their best to clean the mess the Mandalorian and his target made. You tried your best to keep the young on entertained in the back while waiting for his Mandalorian dad to return. Even though looking after some random man's child wasn’t on your to-do list, you did so anyway without any complaint. You were actually very fond of children, so you found it to be quite a treat.</p><p>   Hours had gone by before the Mandalorian would return to the Cantina. Honestly by than you were starting to think he wouldn’t come back and that you would be obligated to adopt this adorable little green creature as your own. Which no complaints there, as you had already started to grow fond of the sweet little child in your current care. </p><p>   When he had returned, he was guided to the back by one of your coworkers. There he found you sitting on the store room floor, happily singing and playing with the child. “Ah you’re back,” You had said when you noticed the beskar cladded man's presence in the doorway. “I was starting to think you wouldn’t return,” You continued, now standing with the child in your arms. </p><p>  “I wouldn’t even think to leave him behind,” the Mandalorian replied, almost sounding a bit offended at you thinking he would abandon his adoptive big eared child so easily. </p><p>  You let out a surprised sound, “Oh really? Because you left here quite quickly earlier.” It probably wasn’t the best idea to go in on the Mandalorian and his parenting skills, but your nurturing side obviously thought otherwise. “Do you know how dangerous that is for a child? Leaving him with a random stranger, what if I was some random evil creature who ate children?”</p><p>   The Mandalorian eyed you down, his head tilting to take a glance to the happy child in your hands, “Do you eat-”</p><p> “-NO I DON’T EAT CHILDREN.” </p><p>“So than he was fine,” The bounty hunter replied with a matter of fact tone stepping towards you to take the young one from your grasp. “Besides it’s better than me just leaving him alone on the ship,” You almost didn’t hear the last part as he struggled to pull the clinging child from your hold.</p><p>  “Don’t tell me you leave him alone on the ship while you go out on your jobs,” You felt yourself beginning to frown at the man before you. At first you had merely hoped that this was just a one time sort of incident, but currently it was looking like he left the child to themselves more often. </p><p>   At this point Mando had managed to pull the kid out from your grasp, “It’s not like I have a choice. What? Would you rather I take him on jobs with me?” He said defensively. “Don’t give me that look, I know leaving him alone is bad. I’ve been meaning to hire an on board caretaker, but I haven’t really found anyone suitable.” </p><p>  Your frown deepened at the Mandalorian’s explanation, “That still doesn’t make it ok you know.”</p><p>    He gave you a small nod, seemingly pondering in thought as he once again tilted his helmet down to look upon the child. The child had obviously taken quite a liken to you in the hours which you cared for him. Mando was actually surprised to see the child struggle in his grasp and make grabby hands in your direction. He watched as you held out finger to the little one, a small smile gracing your cheeks when the child grabbed it.</p><p>   “Speaking of hiring an onboard caretaker, how much would it take for you to leave your job at this Cantina?” </p><p>-- </p><p>  Months had passed since that incident and when you think back at it you couldn’t help but smile. Mando had offered to hire you to watch over the child when he was off on his bounty jobs. He had seen how well you took of the child and how quickly the child had taken a liking to you. Having always wanting to escape your lonely life back on your home planet, you pretty much agreed instantly. Admittedly, your growing worry for the child's safety in the hands of the bounty hunter was also a major reason for you to agree to working for Mando, but either way you considered it a win-win scenario. You got to escape your sad old life and the child had someone to watch over him when his adoptive dad went out to work.</p><p>   However, your concerns of the Mandalorian’s parenting skills diminished as you quickly learned just how much this man cared for the child, truly treating the little one as if it were his own. You saw first hand how attentive and nurturing the bounty hunter could be in his own little ways. His life evolved around the child in every way, whether he meant for it to or not. He truly cared for the child and did his best to keep him safe. In all honesty, you found the whole thing rather sweet.</p><p>   This is where some problems started to arise.  </p><p>  You know, those ‘Oh no I have feelings for this Mandalorian’ kind of problems.  When you first realized your feelings, you had desperately tried to hide them which proved to be quite difficult. The more time that went on, the stronger your feelings for him became and the worse his seemed to get for you. </p><p>  At the start of you working for him, the Mandalorian was mostly silent, only interacting and speaking to you when he felt it necessary. He was rather offish, keeping himself at a distance from you. You had high hopes up until recently, as for some months now you two had appeared to grow closer. He talked to you more and even began to pay more attention to your interests. He had started to relax more around you, even starting  to crack a joke with you here and there. It was a refreshing change and one your crushing self embraced wholeheartedly. This change only strengthened your growing affection for the man, your heart swelling at the thought that maybe, just maybe, he might even have grown to like you too. </p><p>  Some weeks ago though, Mando had started to act as he had in your first months together, but it was somehow worse. Lately he had been more prone to snapping out at you for the most little things. At first you thought maybe he had just been more on edge due do almost losing you and the child to a shotty job. This theory came about because all his nit picking had mostly involved your caretaking of the child, but lately it had turned into anything he found even remotely wrong. It was starting to upset you greatly, especially since you truly did really like the bounty hunter and it pained your soul to think that your crush might actually hate you.</p><p>   Even with all this happening with Mando, you kept yourself high, trying to tell yourself that his moodiness and bad attitude would change soon enough. Stress could make anyone go in a foul mood. Mind you taking it out on others wasn’t the best method of dealing with it, but you figured Mando might have just struggled more with it because of his lack of closeness with other people. You imagined he might not be too in touch with his feelings and struggled with interactions because of it. So, you did your best to put up with it, hoping everything would just get back to normal soon. However, it didn’t and today made the possibility of Mando hating you very apparent. </p><p>  A common occurrence while looking after the child was him getting into things he really shouldn’t. Usually, you managed to catch him before anything completely horrible happened and you usually managed to clean up whatever mess he made before Mando returned. However, this time you didn’t have the time to clean it up before he returned, as you were more concerned with the child’s safety. To say he wasn’t impressed is an understatement. In fact he was very upset by it. You couldn’t really blame him for being upset. If you had walked in to your massive collection of weapons all over the place with your child in the middle of it all, you probably would have panicked as well. Even so, you probably wouldn’t have tore into him the way he did to you. </p><p>   It’s not like you meant for the child to get into the weapon hatch while you made him some food and it’s not like you meant for him to make a mess of it. It’s not like you wanted to turn around because of a strange sound only to see the small child holding a plaster and surrounded by Mando’s weapons everywhere. </p><p>   How did he manage to do all that behind your back without you noticing? You honestly didn’t know. You didn’t even know how he had managed to get the weapon hatch opened in the first place. Of course, just as you managed to get the blaster from the child’s small grasp and were checking him over, your Mandalorian companion had returned and discovered the mess. </p><p>  “What were you thinking?! Why would you let him get into there?” Mando said, almost viciously, quickly striding over to take the child from your hands. </p><p>   You bite the inside of your cheek, your frown deepening and your heart sinking at the Mandalorian’s words, “I didn’t let him! I was just making him some food and then turned back to see what he had done.”</p><p>  “You shouldn’t have left him alone! What if he got hurt? Than what?!” You flinched hearing his angry tone, never hearing Mando sound so angry before in your time together. He took the child from you quickly, holding the now confused child close to him, looking him over for any injuries. </p><p>   Deep down you knew Mando was right in that regard, what if the child had gotten hurt? You would have felt horrible if something dreadful had happened to the little one, but it was the next part which really destroyed you.</p><p>   “I thought I hired you to take care of and look after him. You need to do your job or else what’s the point of having you around?!” </p><p>  Now that really done it. You felt the tears you had tried to hold in begin to slip down your cheeks. “I’m sorry” was all that you were able to mumble out as you tried to keep your composure in front of the man that you had been pining for this whole time. </p><p> Your heart had shattered in that moment, realizing just how little Mando thought of and cared about you. You were easily replaceable and the Mandalorian obviously had no problems replacing you if he wanted. In fact, at this point you wouldn’t be surprised if he did. It had become obvious that Mando didn’t really like you much at all in the past month.</p><p> To him you were just someone he had hired, just an employee. Not even a friend. Just some random person he hired off of some random planet. Maybe you were foolish for ever thinking he could even remotely like you the way you like him. </p><p>  “I’m sorry, I’ll clean this up ok?” You sniffled pitefully, attempting to wipe away any tears that had already ran down your cheeks. </p><p>  The Mandalorian had visibly stiffened, whatever left in his rant completely vanished having seeing your salty tears and pouting lips. He just stood and stared as you cleaned up everything, watching as you struggled desperately to keep yourself together due to his harsh words. The child squirmed in his grasp as he stood there. He was not moving and didn’t say another word before quickly seeming to have collected himself. He strode out of the room with the child and headed up to the cockpit, leaving silence in his wake. </p><p>  When he was out of sight, you quickly broke down into quiet sobs, absolutely heart broken.</p><p> --  </p><p>The rest of the day almost went by normally, other than the fact you were clearly upset and Mando was hating himself for making you that way. See your idea of the Mandalorian hating you was far from how he actually felt. In truth, he had never had the most biggest crush on anyone before, and it absolutely terrified him. You were possibly the sweetest and most intriguing person he had ever met. In his mind you were the most perfect thing to ever exist in his life. </p><p>  The bounty hunter loved how well you took care of the kid and adored seeing how close you were with him. You weren’t pushy like other people when it came to his way of life, in fact you were rather accepting and understanding of it in your own little ways. All of this plus more, meant he fell for you quite quickly, and he honestly didn’t really know how to go about. Mando had never really had any serious relationships before, just a few flings here and there. He knew you were different from all those other people and the way he felt for you was majorly different from them as well. </p><p>  Mando knew that it probably wasn’t the most sensible thing to convince your own crush that you hated them. However, Din Djarin wasn’t almost the most sensible person when it came to his feelings. He had made the personal decision to push you away, as someone like you getting in a relationship with him was probably the worst thing for you. </p><p>Even now, having to put up with his chaotic way of life must be hard, imagine having to add a relationship to it.  For the past month or so he did everything he could to make himself once more at a distance from you. </p><p>   However, he had never meant to make you cry or upset you the way he had, but he did and now he felt absolutely horrible watching you mope around the Razor Crest. Still caring for the child for the remainder of the day as you did. You wouldn’t even spare him a glance and honestly, he didn’t think he deserved one anyway. He was cruel, harsh, and just down right a total asshole to you earlier. He wouldn’t blame you for hating him now. Even if had attempted to make that happen, deep down he wanted the exact opposite.</p><p>  The mandalorian knew that it wasn’t really your fault the child had gotten into the weapons. If anything, it was Mando’s for not properly securing it before he left to complete his job. He knew how much you cared for the child and knew you did everything you could to keep him safe. He knew how much you loved kids and saw on a daily basis how good you were with them. It’s the exact reason he hired you in the first place. He knew you would do a good job and yet there he went saying all those horrible things.</p><p>   As night began to come about, Mando tried to figure out what to say to you and wondered if he even should. No he definitely had to. He needed to apologize for everything, he needed to let you know that he didn’t mean what he said. He needed to let you know how important you were to him and how in his eyes you were irreplaceable. </p><p> For kriff sakes, he was definitely deeply in love with you and he needed to pull himself together so he could properly apologize to you.</p><p>  Silently, he watched as you put the child to bed, listening as you sang a sweet lullaby to lull the child to sleep. He hadn’t made his presence known to you at this point, waiting until you had finished with the child before trying to address anything. So, he wasn’t surprised to see you jump from suddenly seeing the Mandalorian standing behind you after shutting the hatch to the child’s bunk.  </p><p>  “We need to talk.” He said, straight to the point. He could see you visibly swallow and nod. Your eyes dropping to the ground again, not saying anything in response, just waiting for him to continue. This was the moment you were waiting for all day, you thought for sure your trampled soul was fired. “About earlier today, I need to apologize.”</p><p>“What?” Your head snapped up to look directly up at him.  </p><p>  Mando shifted uncomfortably in front of you, “I went over the line and I know I haven’t really been nice this past month or so. It’s unfair to you and just downright cruel of me to treat you like that.”   You continued to stare, not believing what you were hearing. Your mind working overtime to try and understand the fact that you were not being fired, but instead apologized to. Not just apologized to for him being harsh earlier, but for his entire attitude.</p><p> Did someone replace the Mando you knew with a droid when you weren’t looking? </p><p>  “I’m not really good with the whole feelings thing and the whole having a crush on someone. I’ve never felt anything like this before so I thought that pushing you away would be best,” The Mandalorian began to ramble on, losing himself in his words. “My life isn’t exactly one that’s very forgiving with those types of relationships and-”</p><p>“-Wait did you say crush? Like that you… like me kind of deal?”  </p><p> The bounty hunter paused as he felt himself flush underneath his helmet. He looked away almost sheepishly before looking back at you, completely focusing on your presence before him. “Yes,” He said simply. “I like you. A lot. More than I have every liked anyone before. I’d go as far to say that I have even fallen in love with you.” </p><p>  Your heart thumped loudly in your ears, beating rapidly in your chest as a flush washed over your cheeks. Staring at the confessing man before with wide eyes, you tried to form words and failed to do so from the shock. The shock being that man you had the most biggest and unbelievable crush on also liked you back. Mando liked you and he had just said it straight to your face.  </p><p> “I understand that you probably wouldn’t want to return those feelings because of how I behaved but I just wanted to apologize and let you know-”</p><p>“-No!” You cut him off quickly before smacking yourself in the head at dumb outburst. “I mean, I do want to return your feelings! I like you too, like really like you!” You corrected, beginning to ramble about just how much you had a crush on him too, straight to his helmet face. </p><p>  “Mando I-” Your rambling was shut down by the Manadalorian stepping towards you and pulling you straight into his armored chest. </p><p>  Almost losing your breath at the sudden close contact with the man, you felt your blush deepen. Even with all the cold beskar between you, you could still feel the heat radiating from his tall form as he wrapped his arms tightly around you.</p><p>   He held you there like that for a good solid minute, no words being exchanged as you stood in the middle of the Razor Crest being embraced by him. Nuzzling yourself a bit closer to him, you wrapped your arms around his torso as you felt a bubble of happiness radiate through you. You listened to his breathing through his helmet and felt as his gloved hands gripped you tightly. The thoughts of the earlier conflict far from your mind. </p><p>  Suddenly, he straightened himself, tilting his helmet down in your direction while still making sure to hold you close to him. He was unreadable to you behind the helmet like this, but honestly you could care less about all that. You knew deep in your heart, that it didn’t matter to you if you never saw his face, you just wanted to be by his side. “Being with me will be difficult.” </p><p> You smiled at his words, your hand leaving his back to come to rest at the edge of his helmet. Leaning forward onto your toes, you pressed a soft kiss to where his mouth would be located.</p><p>“I wouldn’t trade it for anything else in the Universe.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Bonus: </p><p>Reader: “So…. what part of ‘make the person I like hate me’ screamed being a good idea to you?”</p><p>Mando: “Are you ever going to let that go?”</p><p>Reader: “Nooope.”</p></blockquote></div></div>
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